Through this project, we subvert the idea of the researcher as an external observer, becoming active participants within the very collective being studied—experiencing its practices from the margins to discover perspectives beyond the traditionally recognized ones. The prevailing notion suggests that such individuals are sexually—and at times emotionally—“impenetrable” due to trauma, or that, in the case of stone identities, they exist in a dysphoric state that prevents them from “seeing themselves as women” during sexual practices.

We aim to create a space for critical reflection around these assumptions and to seek out other ways of understanding the undeniable diversity surrounding stone*-ace experiences. The project is grounded in an experimental process that involves touching the body of a stone+-ace subject (one’s own body) through various materials. In this work, one of us creates multiple body molds of the other in a repetitive process that forces us to look, again and again, at the lover’s body from new perspectives. Through this, we aim to find different contrasexual ways of touching and gazing at the body of the person toward whom affection is felt.